Eyes of the Wolf

14
Holy crud, holy crud…going to a party at Niko’s house…Dad had said yes…

Like a good friend this time, I called Chris. She sounded thrilled too, and declared to me that she would take me shopping for something to wear. When she shifted back to her serious voice, she repeated that we were going to the mall, and demanded that she be given to my Dad. The conversation was brief, and I was quickly set to go to Skyview mall on Wednesday to get something she called “suitable to wear.”

The shopping experience after school went as expected. I persuaded my redheaded friend that I did not need strappy, baby-blue heels, but a new pair of tennis shoelaces. We compromised by getting me a new pair of Adidases. My baggy pants were unacceptable. She immediately brought me a pair of tights and a short skirt to go over them, which I just as swiftly vetoed for a pair of blue jeans that I discovered, upon trying them in the dressing room, were much tighter than anything I had ever worn before other than the one time I had to wear stockings for a wedding. Realizing I was ready to refuse them, Chris held up the tights and skirt combo again, and I decided the lesser of two evils would be fine.

Shirts were not as much of a problem; well, at least after we had steered clear of Victoria’s Secret. I refused—outright refused!—to wear any shirt that was that shade of pink, with such a slinky cat on it. Not that I minded cats, but I would never give one a collar with a heart tag on it. Plus, it was so blatantly feminine that I knew that, even though it was a nasty little stereotype, I would feel slightly like one of those girls that were now (as Chris put it) giving BJs to BJ. Once we got over the fact that I didn’t get what she thought was a very good joke, we went to another store and bought a small grey Big Dog shirt.

As I rolled the shirt into the bag, Chris sighed in exasperation. “Okay, let’s get you something that’s actually feminine, m’kay?” She took hold of my shoulders from behind and began pushing me forward, which was made much less awkward by the fact that I was still walking.

“I bought the girl jeans, though,” I protested halfheartedly, arguing for the sake of it.

“Uh-uh. Not enough.”

“Honestly, Chris, what could I possibly wear that we haven’t bought already?” We made what I considered a sudden right turn. Upon recognizing the jewelry store, I was promptly confused. “Chris, I can’t wear any of that.” She continued her pushing. “CHRIS, we don’t have the money…”

“Not for that,” she said, abruptly spinning me to my left and almost smashing my face against the glass case of an elaborate diamond necklace. “But…” She turned me to a display next to the cash register. Different colored studs formed two vertical lines, with months next to them.

Understanding came quickly.

“Uh-uh,” I balked. “Chris, I can’t…”

“I already asked your dad, and he said you CAN,” she rebutted smoothly. “I didn’t want to go
to Claire’s, so I told him it wouldn’t be as cheap of jewelry, but he said okay and gave me the money for it, so you just pick out a pair and we’ll have you all set.”

“Chris…”

“You’re an April, so you can get the pearl one—that’s really pretty,” she commented. “They have it in silver too, and you can get it so it’s either set into the little prongs or the circle thingy—”

“Chris…”

“So do you want gold or silver with the pearls or without?”

“Do I get a say in this?”

I got quite a scathing look for that one. “Maya, you’re one of the only people I know that doesn’t have their ears pierced. It’s really not that big a deal anyway.”

Groaning, I turned again to the display, thinking about it. The pearls were kinda pretty, especially if I got them with the silver around them. I didn’t know that I could get them without the prongs holding the stone in—the shining metal ring around the animal-made stone was quite elegant, I thought. The plain gold or silver ones didn’t look as nice either.

“…Really, two year olds get their ears pierced all the time—”

“Okay, okay,” I interrupted, instantly stopping the wordflow. I made eye contact with the cashier. “Can I get…Can I get my ears pierced with that one?”

“Of course,” said the man, a kind looking, mid-thirties-looking man with absolutely no hair on his head. “Can I see some form of ID?” When I showed him my school ID, which seemed to ease the suspicion of my being a child under sixteen—shortness could really stink sometimes—he nodded and said, “Right this way, ma’am.”

He had me sit on the chair, and started dipping a cottonball in what smelled like alcohol and wiping it liberally on my ear. Chris stood at my right, holding my hand, and gave it a tight squeeze when I saw the extra-mini pistol in his hand, except with odd little metal fittings at the muzzle instead of a hole. He pulled out a Crayola marker—of a really pretty teal color, I distantly noticed—and tapped me in each earlobe with it. I had only just begun to try to puzzle this out when I saw him fixing a stud into the gun.

“It’s okay,” Chris breathed into my ear. Her arm was around mine, and she could probably feel the pulse spike against the side of her wrist as he brought the little device to my ear.
“Just hold still…”

PUNCH.

A short stab of pain went through my left ear. As he moved to the other one, Chris rotated as well, and whispered into my now-throbbing ear, “Not so bad. Just one more.”

She was right. It didn’t hurt much at all. My earlobe had settled into a kind of dull throbbing that was noticeable, but not very painful. When the other one was shot too, I barely even reacted. The man handed me a hand mirror, and I admired the studs in my ears as he talked to Chris and accepted the payment for the earrings. The pearls stood out brightly against my light-brown skin, and the silver gave them a slightly ethereal appearance.

Suddenly bright green eyes came into sharp existence above the mirror.

“Wow, he did a really good job with those,” she remarked, sounding thoroughly happy about the proceedings. The man beamed, then told me that I would have to use cotton and the liquid in the bottle—he gave it to me—to clean the posts twice a day for six weeks before I could remove them, and then that I wasn’t supposed to keep the starter earrings after that six-week term. It all sounded fine to me. No problem.

“Of course, you actually should keep the starters,” Chris informed me after we left the store. “I don’t know why they tell you not to wear them, ‘cause they’re the best to wear all the time, ‘cause the holes close really easily for a year afterward. Any other earring, you can’t sleep in. It also helps keep everything going well by twisting the earring between your fingers.”

“Like this?” I spun the posts in their holes with my thumb and forefinger, at first with a bit of resistance, then in a kind of gliding ease. It hurt a bit, but, again, it wasn’t terrible pain. The pearls were round, and smooth against the pads of my fingertips.

“Yep. And make sure you clean them when you’re supposed to, morning and night, until those six weeks are up, ‘cause it really sucks ass having to try to deal with an infection in your piercing and you can’t remove the earring…”